


Tabula Rasa

by Fibonaccii



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 09:30:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10919061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fibonaccii/pseuds/Fibonaccii
Summary: He doesn't remember. Everything that they once were is gone.





	Tabula Rasa

"Who are you?"

Jason winces. He knew those words were coming, but it still feels like a knife to the chest to hear them. Worse, actually, since Jason had been stabbed on more than one occasion.

"I- ah- I'm Jason."

"Jason?" Tim says, looking at him with his sharp blue eyes. All the familiarity is gone. His eyes no longer scrunch up at the corners like they did before, and they look at him with a blank, glossy gaze that seems to cut Jason to his center and yet not touch him at all simultaneously.

"Okay. I'm Tim."

"I know." Jason says, then winces. He knows he's not supposed to say things like that to Tim, not when he's barely been awake for a day.

Awkward silence fills the room, and Jason aches. He feels uneasy and out of place, the natural understanding that he and Tim had fallen into entirely gone. Everything feels too heavy and wrong. The worst part is that there is nothing Jason can do to fix it. There's no enemy to punch in the face, no plot to think his way out of. Here, the enemy and the damsel in distress are both Tim. Tim versus his own mind.

It doesn't make sense to Jason. How can Tim, with his eidetic memory and superb intelligence just forget so much? Whole parts of his brain just wiped clean, like someone dumped all the clutter of his mind off onto the floor where it was swept away with the trash. Jason was swept away with the trash.

"So..." Tim says, fiddling with his hands in a way Jason knows means he’s feeling uncomfortable. "They say I'm your brother." Jason winces again at that.

"I guess you could say that. It's really more complicated. Neither of us ever really thought of one another that way." Jason says, unable to look Tim in the eye while he says it. It's too complicated for Jason to ever explain. How can he? What could he say? _I'm your legally dead, adopted half-brother who has tried to kill you on more than one occasion? Then, you thought I was okay for whatever crazy reason, and decided to give me another chance, and somehow we ended up..._ what? Dating? Jason guesses he could call it that.

"Okay." Tim says, sounding like he was trying to make sense of what Jason's told him. The confusion and anxiety on Tim's face makes Jason want to reach out and comfort him, but since Tim doesn't remember him, his comfort would be unwarranted and unwanted.

After all, without whatever it was that made Tim give him a chance, Jason has zero appeal to Tim. None. The thought is a solemn one, and it makes Jason's heart squeeze in his chest.

"I should probably go." Jason says, standing. "Uh, bye, Tim." He turns to leave, but stops with a hand on the doorknob when Tim speaks.

"Wait." Jason can't help the hopeful swelling that rises in him. He remembers, he knows who Jason is. "Will you ask Dick to come back? I want to talk to him more." Of course not. Jason hates himself for hoping.

 

"Yeah." Jason says with a slightly choked voice. "Yeah, you got it." Then, he pushes out of the room, doing his best to ignore the heat that prickles in the corner of his eyes.

Of course not. The Tim that Jason knew is gone.

He’s not coming back.


End file.
